Life Changing Experiences in India

In coming back from a semester based in Delhi, India with program SIT Study Abroad, the incredible difference in cultures and people strikes me off guard. The face of consumerism and a separate world look me in the eye as I drive out of the airport and back to my home in Memphis, Tennessee. Delhi was an enormous city with some 20 million people living there. The city was rich with history, sights to see, and places to go. Even after a few months spent in Delhi, there were still things I looked forward to seeing.

The main thing that I feel I got out of SIT was the internship/ independent study project experience. I chose the one-month internship and was working with a phenomenal nonprofit organization called Jaipur Foot. Jaipur Foot was working with providing the people from any background prosthetic limbs free of cost. It was great to be on my own and the professional work experience obtained was priceless. The class structure of SIT could not have been better. It would involve many guest speakers discussing different aspects of public health in India for a week or two and then going into the field to places around India to see much of what was being studied with our own eyes. These excursions included going to rural Indian villages and studying how they function, a trip to Thailand to study their hospitals and healthcare system in place, as well as several other excursions around India. There was ample free time even with the program being highly academic.

The faculty at SIT could not have been better. They were not only excellent teachers with knowledge of what they spoke of and how to teach it but wonderful friends that I and certainly many of the rest of the students will continue to stay in touch with for years to come. Some of them have become great connections for not just India but places around the world. I look forward to going back to India to revisit them. I definitely feel that the experience through classes and faculty was unique to SIT and the opportunity would not be easily obtained through many other programs or certainly tourism.

In conclusion, to study abroad in India was a life-changing experience. So many new skills were learned and new memories formed that I definitely come back to the States feeling more complete with myself and satisfied with the choice I made. After visiting India I feel all the more confident to do anything in life.

Isaac Fournier is majoring in Biology (pre-professional). He spent a semester studying Public Health, Gender, and Community Action in New Delhi, India through SIT Study Abroad. Isaac had the following to say about his time abroad, “New experiences, lifelong memories, and a different culture, India is for the adventurous.”